Must-read: Mark Thoma: “The State of American Politics”

Must-Read: Mark Thoma: The State of American Politics: “Paul Ryan, in a speech…

…on the state of American politics, says:

We don’t lock ourselves in an echo chamber, where we take comfort in the dogmas and opinions we already hold.

Followed by:

… in 1981 the Kemp-Roth bill was signed into law, lowering tax rates, spurring growth, and putting millions of Americans back to work.

Bruce Bartlett:

… I was the staff economist for Rep. Jack Kemp (R-N.Y.) in 1977, and it was my job to draft what came to be the Kemp-Roth tax bill, which Reagan endorsed in 1980 and enacted the following year…. Republicans like to say that massive growth followed the Reagan tax cut. But average real GDP growth during Reagan’s eight years in the White House was only slightly above the rate of the previous eight years: 3.4 percent per year vs. 2.9 percent. The average unemployment rate was actually higher under Reagan than it was during the previous eight years: 7.5 percent vs. 6.6 percent…